Six Ways, Book 2: Duty

by the_bioXpony_guy

Chapter 14: Villagers Can Only Beware

The heat vanished in an instant, but the agonizing burns on Rarity's legs still persisted, leaving her to moan in pain as the surrounding volcanic desert turned into a tundra.

Fluttershy could hardly believe her eyes. Had she truly just witnessed lava turn into ice? What force could possibly be powerful enough to accomplish such a feat? Her eyes darted here and there as she asked, “What was that?”

Rainbow Dash spotted the perpetrator and felt her blood draw to a freeze. “I think it was him!” she said with a gasp, pointing toward the mountains. The other Equestrians followed the direction of her hoof and noticed—camouflaged in the white of a snowy mountaintop—a stranger unlike any they had seen before.

Standing at the top of a snowy decline, the unknown warrior emerged from a mist of snow. Like a knight of the tundra, this figure held a sword in one hand and a shield in the other. Like Lewa and the Equestrians before him, he wore a mask that almost completely covered his face—but in his case, three robotic eyes covered up what should have been one right eye. Were she close enough to see and had she not still found herself within the jaws of a frozen frog, Rarity would marveled at the intricate, fantastical mask design.

The confused Toa of Earth had so many questions to ask—but before a single one of them could settle within her head, the white knight threw his shield down along the snowy hill and, for a split-second, chased after it as it went sliding down. His feet hit the shield and the knight came sledding down at a brisk, yet alarming speed. He looked as though he planned to attack the Equestrians before they could attempt to escape.

The closer he drew, the colder the air seemed to become. Twilight could already tell this character was going to be Fluttershy’s partner during their time on this island—but how would Fluttershy react to his mere presence? Would she react in the same way she had with her Teridax rock—always secluding herself from others and wondering what meaning her life holds? Twilight didn’t want to think about it, but how could she not?

After a short amount of time, the knight’s sled came to a gradual stop around the base of the snowy, steady decline. Without a word, he kicked his sled-shield off the ground and into his hand once again. Having seen him slide down the snowy decline, some of the Equestrians had forgotten that this circular tool was a shield first and sled second.

With the stranger's presence came a cold, awkward aura of silence. Fluttershy wanted to say something, but her natural shyness kept her quiet; Rarity wanted to thank him, but the blank look on his face made her wonder if he was anything more than a lifeless drone; Twilight wanted to ask who he was, but by the time she could get those words on the tip of her tongue, he had already passed her, making his way to the volcano.

The sound of every step he took resonated in the Equestrians’ ears. Even Spike—still trapped in his soil igloo—couldn’t help but shiver as the knight’s mechanical echoed all around him. He felt a little vibration whenever this man’s feet touched the ground, yet the stranger seemed hardly like the kind of creature to cause such a rumble—albeit a very low rumble. All this he felt without even seeing him.

A few steps later, the humanoid figure touched a foot to the frozen lava—and just as Rarity stepped out from the amphibious jaws of her personal predator. As the pony’s hoof touched solid ground, she found herself struggling to stay up on the slippery surface. Recently frozen, the solid lava beneath her had round bumps all over its surface, making Rarity uncomfortable going anywhere.

The stranger briefly stopped in his tracks and looked down on Rarity, as if to say, “Do you want me to help you?” Rarity couldn’t do anything but stare at his intricately-crafted mask and wonder, Is he a Toa? She continued staring, her mouth open but saying nothing; he carried on.

Not much further still, the white knight managed to climb up the volcano’s face before stopping once again. Is he going to freeze all the lava in that thing? wondered Twilight. Is that even possi—well, this person just froze a pack of lava frogs, but— The more she thought about this world’s laws of thermodynamics, the more intense her migraine became. I mean—there’s no way he’s going to freeze all of it—just enough to keep those bugs away, right? There’s just no way; he can’t possibly freeze an entire volcano!

For a good second, the silent rogue stood still. They’re definitely still in there, he thought, hearing the buzzing insects moving around as they struggled to keep themselves quiet. And they’re not coming out any time soon. That’s good. Without further hesitation, he flipped his sword upside-down and drove it deep into the volcano’s face. Almost immediately, the ground below him froze beneath a layer of ice—and with the sudden transformation came absolute silence.

Even from a good hundred feet away, the Equestrians not no trouble witnessing this incredible display of power. Any little bit of buzzing from within the volcano ceased in an instant—and with that, the knight used his shield as a sled once more and came sliding down the volcano’s slippery slope.

At that point, Twilight still failed to comprehend this world’s physics, Rarity still struggled to get back onto solid earth, Spike still couldn’t manage to get out of his tiny prison, and Fluttershy could only let her jaw hang open. Yet the knight seemed not to notice the Equestrians
around him as he made it back down to the base of the volcano.

It wasn’t until Rarity screamed and landed flat on her face when he paid the newcomers any heed. He noticed as Rarity sat back up and started rubbing her sore nose. “Ow,” she moaned. “Is my nose bleeding? No—I don’t think so…”

As she mumbled to herself, Rarity failed to notice as the white knight came by her side. His sudden appearance startled her—but what astonished her more than his quiet approach was his ability to resist slipping on this bumpy ground.

He reached a hand down and helped Rarity back up, holding her by her hoof. Normally Rarity would have blushed at the notion of being picked off the ground by another man, but this man hadn’t a hoof to pull her up—only cold, metallic, gripping fingers. Instead of blushing, she found herself shuddering.

“Come on,” he said, his voice deep and calm and soft all at once. “Off the ice.” He continued holding Rarity’s hoof as he guided her back toward the fresh soil. “You’re obviously not the other Toa of Ice I was told about.”

Rarity wanted to scoff at the knight’s rude behavior, but found herself cut off when Fluttershy finally stepped in. “Um—actually,” she began, her voice projected more than usual. “That would be me.”

“I thought so.”

“And you’re the Toa I’m supposed to team up with?” She hoped the question wasn’t too intrusive.

He nodded.

Twilight spoke this time. “Oh, good! I was wondering when we would find the next one of you.”

The yellow-and-white pony continued. “I’m Fluttershy.” She paused and looked up at the stranger, witnessing as his cold blue eyes stared back into hers. “Um—what’s your name?”

The character blinked. “Kopaka.”

Their conversation was interrupted by a voice unfamiliar to Kopaka sounded from what seemed out of nowhere. “Guys? Get me out of here!” It was Spike. “It’s starting to get musty in this thing!”

Rarity heard the dragon-boy’s voice and felt her heart leap into her throat. “Oh, dear goodness!” she exclaimed, running to his soil shelter. Knowing anything that had stood so long must have retained some level of strength to it, Rarity predicted it would have taken more than a few minutes to break the boy out.

Absentmindedly, she tapped the igloo with a single hoof and watched it turn to dust.

She surprised herself. It was that easy? she thought. For how long had she underestimated her own abilities?

Coughing, Spike shook the dirt out of his scales and said, “Thanks, Rarity.” He wasn’t sure, but he thought he could feel himself blushing. Such a realization made Spike want to slap himself. Get it together! shouted a voice in his head.

As Spike attempted to regain some level of masculinity, Twilight took a step toward Kopaka and began to explain the weight of their situation. “Kopaka,” she began, hoping not to surprise the quiet Toa. “I know this all seems very strange, but we have come to this island to help you and your brothers in your war against Makuta.”

The unamused Toa blinked. “Go on.”

His words stung the pony’s ears a little. He doesn’t believe me, does he? I guess it’d be hard to believe in a group of fish out of water. Twilight took a deep breath before continuing. “We were directed to Mata Nui by a group of elders known as the Rahaga.”

“The Turaga,” corrected Kopaka.

Part of Twilight wanted to smack Kopaka for interrupting her—but another part wondered where Kopaka had heard such terminology. Her ear twitched and she replied, “No—I mean the Rahaga.”

She paused and watched as Kopaka’s eyes bored into her own, unresponsive and unblinking. Her lips pursed, she took another deep breath and diverged from the topic. “Never mind; the only thing you need to take from me is that my friends and I have been sent here to help you.

“I know you have no real reason to believe us; for crying out loud, the we probably look like—what was the word?—rahi. We probably look like rahi to you, but you have to believe me when I say that we are here to help you and your brothers. One of us even went with your brother in the jungle.”

Kopaka let out a nearly inaudible chuckle as he scanned the crowd before him. “I thought one of you was missing.” Looking down at Twilight, he asked, “So your friend is now with Lewa?”

The Toa of Water nodded. “If by Lewa you mean the green one who likes to pull pranks, then yes.”

Kopaka rolled his eyes. “Yep—that’s Lewa, all right.”

From behind them, the two Toa heard somebody clearing her throat. There they found Fluttershy. “I don’t mean to rush,” she said, “but I think we should get going.”

It wasn’t even yesterday when the Equestrians last plundered through an icy wasteland, yet here they walked amongst mounds of snow—as opposed to the crystalline skyscrapers of Metru Nui. A few of them had to squint their yes just to keep themselves from seeing nothing but blinding white.

The two Toa of Ice spoke not one word as they ventured side-by-side to Ko-Koro. Instead of talking, Fluttershy took this time to absorb her surroundings—which left her mesmerized in their wintry and relatively motionless ways.

It wasn’t too often when the pegasus noticed a tree’s torso growing and attempting to nourish off the rock-hard ground. Every tree had snow coming up to its waist. Could she even imagine herself covered up in a coat of snow on a breezy winter afternoon—without a friend, without a family to accompany her as she struggled to evolve?

With every step she took, the bark along the trees’ faces seemed to chip away bit by brittle bit. They were dry from lack of any liquid water; now that Fluttershy had taken a moment to think about it, her lips were rather dry, as well.

“This will be as far as you can go.”

Kopaka’s deep voice pulled Fluttershy out of her thoughts. Like everypony else, she tilted her head up to the Toa and heeded his words.

The native Toa continued. “Not that much further is the village that I come from. I’m only going to bring your Toa of Ice with me.”

“Understandable,” said Twilight with a nod. She turned to face her friends when she affirmed, “In that case, I guess we all better get going to our own respective villages.”

“But wait,” Kopaka protested, his voice sounding actually a little bit concerned. “Before you do that, I need to warn you about the villagers.”

He now had the ponies’ eyes and ears. “Whenever one of you goes into whatever village you’re trying to get into, you need to send just one person over. I assume you’re going to Onu-Koro next. When you get to the cave that leads there, just send your Toa of Earth and nobody else.”

“Now, you wait!” commanded Rainbow Dash. The Equestrians and Kopaka turned their heads toward her as she stepped forward and asked, “If we leave our friends behind, what are we gonna do if they get attacked? Just up and leave?”

The Toa of Fire’s hotheadedness humored Kopaka. “Trust me—if they see just one of you, they won’t hurt you. If they see any more than one, they’ll get concerned.”

Twilight nodded. “He’s right, Rainbow Dash. We just have to go in one at a time.”

And with that, the Toa of Ice turned his head toward what looked like a village of silhouettes crowded in snowy mist. He then looked over his shoulder, his gaze pointed at Fluttershy as he asked through his camera-like eyes, Are you okay to go?

Fluttershy blinked. I think I’m ready, said she, her breath still. She took another moment to absorb her surroundings, and—with a sudden inhale—continued walking by his side. The two Toa of Ice left without a single word. Within a few steps, they became one with the surrounding mist—became two phantoms swimming in their native element.

Never before had she walked into such a freezing climate—yet never before had she felt so close to home.